Summer School

July 4th, yesterday, was the first day of the kids's summer school at the masjid. When I picked them up, S already had an assignment : memorize Surah An Naba from ayat 1 -17. I balked inside, but didn't say anything, for S's sake.

She worked on it as soon as we got home. We continued this morning after Fajr and before she left for the masjid.

The Golden Hours, that's what Muhammad Ibn Faqih said when we took Route 114 in Dearborn. One tip to memorizing Quran is to do it during the golden hours: 5 am - 8 am. I did that with S today.

Summer is hard. She has to wake up for Fajr, which is really early : before 6 am. She prays Maghrib which is at around 9 am. So she only goes to bed around 9:30 pm. That's not enough sleep for a kid. Doc said kids under 10 should get 10 hours if I'm not mistaken.

At first I let her go back to sleep after Fajr. However, I don't usually get things done later on during the day if I don't do them right after Fajr. One of those things is, her Quran recitation. So I told her that she could go back to sleep after we read Quran. She complied.

After receiving this assignment, hubby told me not to make her read Quran but work on her memorization instead. This morning after we gave salam, he asked S,

"Do you want to go back to sleep?"

"Yes, but I can't," she sounds almost on the verge of crying.

I felt sorry for her, but I also couldn't help thinking the good this might give her in the long run, insyaallah.

I worked with her until just before 7 am, and then told her she can go back to sleep.

People have asked me,

"Do you have them call you teacher when you're teaching them?"

The question struck me as very hilarious at first. After a while, I realized that it's somewhat a legit question. Homeschooling, despite its world wide patronage is still quite a mystery to the world at large.

No, I don't have them call me teacher. My role as a mother is still there, but I'm also a teacher. Naturally all mothers are teachers. It's a mother's job to raise her children, and by raising I mean teaching them values in life. Mothers who homeschool simply differ from non homeschooling mothers in the sense that they take on the full responsibility of educating their children.

Mothers who do not homeschool still have to help their children with their homework. It's the same. The hassle is somewhat the same, except it might be a little more with homeschooling mothers, because it's a full responsibility instead of a partial or shared one.

If I do not teach my children, no one else will. Thus, I cannot afford to plunge myself into taking on other responsibilities outside my home and leave the ones at home. I just realized this recently what with all the projects I volunteered for and are about to volunteer for.

I realized that my time is fully occupied at home. At times I cannot even afford to pick up the phone. At times it makes me feel like I'm selfish, but honestly, my day IS very occupied. At times I don't even have time to chat with hubby because we're both so tired to chat. Quality time with the family is very important to me. I guess you could say I am somewhat of a geek. Okay, maybe a full time geek, but I have a new saying: geek is good, or better yet, geek is great.

The concept of a mother as a teacher is not strange at all when you really think about it. My children do not have a problem listening to me when I teach them (well generally speaking). One question I always get from people is,

"Don't you have problems of them not paying any attention to you?"

We all know how kids don't listen when their mothers teach them. To the kids, only what the teacher says goes. What the mother says, falls second to what 'teacher' says.

Well, not necessarily. If you, as a mother, take on that role of an educator from the moment your children are infants, the role will build itself naturally bi iznillah. That is the true role of mothers. That role and responsibility is an honor bestowed to us mothers by Allah. We should embrace it wholeheartedly.

When we took Fiqh Of Love in Indianapolis, Yaser Birjas asked the brothers and sisters to form a group and jot down five best criterias of their spouses/future spouses. One of the brothers' criterias is intelligence.

"Look at how men think. They expect women to think like them. See, they choose intelligence," he said.

Later on, hubby told me,

"That's not the only way we can look at it. You marry a woman because of her intelligence so you would have intelligent children."

I honestly never thought of it that way, though I vaguely remember him saying that years ago. It made me think.

Education is NEVER wasted. I have a Bachelor's degree, and I'm not working. Generally people will say I'm wasting my education. My mother would have a fit if she hears that, that much I know. Education is never a waste, especially for mothers. This is because they will be the one in charge of educating their children. However, nowadays, people only think of the secular education, which is not correct.

Sa'id Ibn Al Mussayyab was one of the tabi'een living during the time of Abdul-Malik's reign. The Caliph asked to maryy his daughter but Sa'id refused, amd married her to one of his students instead.

One day as his new son in law was about to go out of his house to attend Sa'id's study circle, his new wife asked hime where he was going.

"To your father's halaqa," he answered.

"Sit down. I have all of his knowledge," she replied.

Such a blessing it is to be married to a wife who is not only educated in the worldly sense, but more so in the matters of the deen, for she is the one who will raise the future generation. The future of the ummah somewhat lies in her hands so to speak.




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